


a handheld digital pet

by sandpapersnowman



Series: Janey Springs' Emporium o' Fics [1]
Category: Borderlands (Video Games)
Genre: Developing Friendships, Gen, Tamagotchis, Worldbuilding, that is Not a ship tag they are buddies and their friendship is central to this fic hence the tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-23
Updated: 2018-04-23
Packaged: 2019-04-27 00:05:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14413371
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sandpapersnowman/pseuds/sandpapersnowman
Summary: While sifting through the remains of a wrecked RSV, Janey Springs finds something she doesn't recognize. She knows someone who might, though.





	a handheld digital pet

**Author's Note:**

> title from the tamagotchi wikipedia lmao. rated T for swearing tbh
> 
> RSV = recreational space vehicle, like an RV lmao  
> Low-I = low intelligence, as in something that can talk to you and understand but doesn't have feelings, opinions, etc, not Real AI

A blown engine and activated escape pods tell a hell of a story, and she's glad that whatever vacationing family this ship belonged to is probably safe somewhere.

She's out in the middle of nowhere, tipped off on a wreck from a business friend of hers, and considering it's one of those rich people RSVs, she's betting on there being something worth her time.

She sets her portable Oz generator down and pops her helmet off. She'll be here a while.

The ship itself could go for scrap -- the hull is thick, and held up to landing pretty well. Getting it out of this area would be an issue, but she can call in favors if she needs once she's cleared out the inside.

She steps through the empty doorway -- the door itself must have depressurized too fast in the crash and exploded off somewhere -- and it's a mess. Canned and preserved food strewn over the floor and walls from the cabinets unlocking, clothes from storage units also strewn _through_ the food, and bits of glass shattered over it all from broken light fixtures and cracked windows.

The GPS Low-I in the dash looks pretty new. Pickle gets first dibs on that kind of thing, and always for free -- she doesn't deal in anything she can't take a wrench to, and he always cuts her in when he finds buyers for things, anyway. She powers it on to make sure it still works and it greets her with a fakely-concerned "We've veered off-course. Is everything okay?" before she powers it back down.

The card for it is only about the size of a bullet, so she simply pockets it.

Most of the appliances in the 'kitchen' area of the RSV are too banged up from the crash, but she finds a toaster that can still heat up, and a decent amount of steel silverware stayed in their drawers. She tosses the silverware in her pack and carries the toaster out front to start the pile of things she can bring back to her garage today.

It's when she's heading back in that she sees it.

It's shaped like an egg, dangling off a bent piece of window frame by a keyring. The tiny screen on it makes her think it's probably a Low-I companion thing, y'know, a little friend in your pocket you can talk to, but it's only got three buttons on the front.

She hits one to see what will happen, and a shittily small image of something that you could _vaguely_ call animal-shaped pops up on the screen.

"Hello!" she says to it. 

It doesn't respond. 

"Do you have a name?"

Still no answer. Most Low-I stuff has voice activation now, so maybe it's vintage, then? Neato.

"I'm going to take you with me," she says out loud to it again, just in case. "I know someone that can take a look at you when we get back to Concordia, okay?"

There's always the chance its own vocal response processors could have gotten knocked out in the crash, and it _is_ supposed to speak to her, and simply can't. She may as well explain that she's not _kidnapping_ it.

She ECHOs Wilhelm before she starts the rest of her sweep through the ship: _found something on a salvage trip I'll pay you to fix. I'll be back in Concordia around sundown if you're interested._

She simply gets _'sure'_ in response.

She gets back to work.

It takes all day, but she ends up with a decent amount of scrap metal torn out from the bits of the kitchen that no longer work and the built-in furniture that she coud detach without anything more complicated than a wrench and drill, and she’s also done her good deed for the week by grabbing any non-ruined clothes and intact food to send out to the charity post.

She sweeps most of the food, glass, and other crap out of the RSV into the dirt and sends the coordinates to her friend who might be up for towing the whole thing, then loads everything she’s taking into her runner and heads back to Concordia.

She hadn’t been sure if Wilhelm would show, considering she’s not sure what the vault hunters’ plans are today or if they’d even be in town, but to her pleasant surprise, he’s waiting in front of her store when she gets in.

“Hey!” she greets him from inside, unlocking her door. “Give me a sec to unload the buggy and I’ll give you the thingy!”

He nods and steps into the top part of the garage with her, watching her jump back downstairs where her runner is parked in the actual _garage_ portion of her shop.

“You need any help?”

“Nah, I got it,” she says, tossing a few thick canvas bags to the other side of the bay. “I’ve got someone swinging by for these tomorrow, I don’t need to get them upstairs or anything.”

He nods again.

“Okay!” she huffs, bags all easily moved with the help of low gravity. “So,” she starts, “there was a crashed RSV way South -- like, a vacation truck, y’know?”

Wilhelm, once again, nods.

“Escape pods deployed and all, no worries there, no bodies, ‘course. Most of the stuff inside got thrown around, but this thing was just caught, like, on a bit of metal stickin’ out. Just perfectly intact.”

She’s pocketed a couple other small things throughout the day, so it takes a moment to dig it and her wallet out.

“I tried voice commands but it didn’t pick anything up? As far as I can tell it’s fine otherwise, but that doesn’t mean much coming from me, I guess. Hell if I know what it’s for.”

She hands Wilhelm $50 in cash to look at it and then hands over the egg.

All he has to do is hit the button that turns the screen on, and after a stunned moment of silence, he hands her money back.

"Oh no," she sighs, thinking it must be broken. "Beyond the point of repair?" she asks.

"I'll pay you for it," Wilhelm answers instead.

"What?" she laughs. "Why? What is it?"

Wilhelm's eyes are _sparkling_.

"It's a Tamadachi," he says. She's never heard this level of enthusiasm in his voice. "Atlas only made them for a couple years before the company went under, and they didn’t sell well so they didn’t make many," he explains. "Now you can only find one if you know the right guy," he says, then winks. It's unthreatening, somehow, even coming from a huge dude. Maybe it's knowing he's not interested in anyone in general, or just the way he's clutching a blue plastic egg to his chest like a baby bird. "Or the right junk dealer."

She laughs again.

"You can have it," she says. "I've never heard of it, so I wouldn't know who to sell it to anyway."

_Wilhelm_ laughs this time.

"Springs," he says. "The last time one of these was on the ECHObay, it sold for almost 400,000 dollars within two minutes."

He waits for those numbers to sink in.

"Holy shit?" she blurts out. It comes out as a question because she can't quite figure out to ask if he's telling the truth. Because, really: holy shit?

"Yeah," he agrees. "I can personally give you 500k for it, but I understand if you want to find another seller. You could probably get about a million for it now."

That's... A _lot_ of money. She could buy her garage in Concordia outright instead of renting it. She could open a second location. Shit, she could open a _fifth_ location.

But... That's half of what Wilhelm got for his contract with Jack. Even if they finish whatever secret mission they're on, that's still a _fourth_ of his pay once it's said and done. He's risking his life for some weird little blooming egomaniac. She can't take that much for something she _stumbled upon_.

"Tell you what," she says instead. "How about you keep it, for no payment," she says, and stops him before he protests, "but you give me a hand once in a while when I get robots in, and put in a good word when someone asks if you know a good scrapper. Yeah?"

He might cry.

"Springs," he warns, "I mean it. These are _priceless_."

"Exactly," she says. "So, no price. You just help out when I need some extra muscle while you're still on Elpis. And tell your nerd friends I sell robot parts," she jokes, though she's not joking at all because she knows he frequents robot-building forums. He's even penpalling with some high schooler that's working on building their own combat robot, which she knows because he used her computer once to send them code from Wolf.

To her surprise, he actually hugs her. She struggles her arms out enough to pat his sides in reciprocation, and when he puts her down, she asks,

"What's so special about it, anyway? What's it do?"

Wilhelm shrugs.

"It’s a little virtual pet," he answers. "It's neat. You can play little games with it where you feed it donuts, I think."

"And?"

Wilhelm thinks for a moment.

"It also poops."

" _Oh my God,_ " Janey mutters, mostly to herself. "I can't believe you tried to pay me _half a million dollars_ for that."

Wilhelm shrugs again, smile still plastered to his face. He has his ECHO in one hand and the egg in the other, now, presumably looking up how to actually use something with nothing but three buttons. Or bragging to his aforementioned nerd friends that he just got a… Tama-something.

Her own ECHO beeps at her; one of her contacts has gotten back to her about towing the RSV to a scrapyard for her. _Nice_.

"I gotta go," she says. "You have fun."

"I will," Wilhelm says, very much like a child handed a new toy.

She's halfway out the door again before he goes 'oh!' to himself.

"Springs?" he calls out.

"Yeah?"

" _Thank you_ ," he beams.

She beams right back at him.

"Of course."

**Author's Note:**

> 'tamagotchi' is a portmanteau of the japanese words for egg and watch, so for borderlands i made it 'tamadachi' from 'egg' (tamago) and 'friend' (tomodachi)
> 
> i love....... bltps. the series this is in is going to be a lot of little fics like this, though not alll janey-centric, so! stay tuned i guess
> 
> i'm also on [tumblr!](https://www.sandpapersnowman.tumblr.com)


End file.
